It wasn’t long ago that ASUS, while beloved by many on the desktop computing scene, was hardly a player when it came to smartphones. Some early Android tablet adopters will remember their Transformer books, but the ZenFone line is relatively new and has been the most serious attempt by ASUS to break into phones. It would be easy to overstate the popularity of the ZenFone, especially in western markets, but there’s no doubt that lovers of Android now have ASUS on their radar.

We at Android Police have looked at several ZenFones and the latest entry is the ZenFone Zoom, which is a characteristic mixture of uniqueness, ambition, value, and zaniness that we have seen before.

The Alcatel [One Touch] Idol 3 [4.7/5.5] was an excellent budget smartphone for 2015. It had an exceptional camera for its price, a great screen, front-facing speakers, and surprisingly decent battery life. It was also more than a bit slow, and it still hasn't been updated to Android 5.1. The Idol 4 and 4S succeed their predecessors with a look back to what those phones did right, but also looking forward to hopefully resolve what they didn't.

The Idol 4S is undoubtedly the more interesting handset, because it's the one with more stuff. An all-new Snapdragon 652 processor that is shaping up to be quite powerful, a 5.5" 2K Super AMOLED display, a 16MP camera with 4K video, dual speakers, an 8MP front-facing camera with its own LED flash, Android 6.0.1, and a sleek new metal and glass body make it clear that Alcatel isn't sleeping at the wheel.

MWC 2016 is set to begin in just two days, and Alcatel has now officially unveiled its two new flagships: the OneTouch Idol 4 and the OneTouch Idol 4S. Both phones show off the best Alcatel has to offer — with their premium build and latest generation specs — but one of the more unexpected features of the new OneTouch Idols may actually be the packaging of the phones. This might not beentirely new to most of our readers, but the box in which both the Idol 4 and Idol 4S come in doubles as a virtual reality headset.

During our hands-on time with both phones, we also had the chance to play around with the VR viewer: it's a lot like Google Cardboard but, well, without the cardboard part.

Remember when Motorola promised that its 2013 phone lineup would be getting over-the-air updates to Android 5.0, almost a year and a half ago? Pepperidge Farm DROID Ultra, DROID Maxx, and DROID Mini owners remember: they've been waiting that long to get their much-needed upgrade, watching with envy while the Verizon-specific phones were passed over and Moto's more general X and G lines got their updates. Not that any of those neglected customers are particularly surprised at this point, but Motorola has finally recanted on its promise: there will be no Lollipop for the Ultra, Maxx, or Mini.

The hype train can't be derailed. With just a few days until the Galaxy S7 is announced, there are plenty of leaks to go around. The latest from SamMobile includes a more detailed look at this phone's specs. According to the leak, the GS7 will indeed have a 12MP camera sensor as previously rumored, and the speaker will have 1.2W of power.

Back at CES, Blu announced two phones: the Vivo XL and Vivo 5. While we've already taken a look at the former, the latter is the one we've really been waiting for. I've had it in-hand for about a week now, and there's honestly a lot to talk about with this handset. From the specs to the design, this definitely offers more than a $200 handset should, though there are definitely some quirks with the software.

But I'm getting ahead of myself now. Let's start at the beginning. And when we get to the end — stop.

LG is sticking to its guns when it comes to offering removable batteries in its phones, but the way it's going about that with the G5 is unusual. All the leaks we've seen thus far show a seemingly unibody device, but now we have a better idea how the battery slides in from a post on Weibo. A user there has posted a picture of the battery and what appears to be the cap from the bottom of the phone. This might be part of LG's rumored "Magic Slot" system.

LG is still cheekily announcing bits and pieces of its G5 flagship before the phone itself. After hinting at the always-on display and unveiling a fancy touch cover for the phone, it's now ramping up expectations about the audio performance of the G5 by announcing a collaboration with B&O PLAY, a sub-division of Bang & Olufsen, the well respected Danish audio and video company.

LG doesn't reveal much about the fruits of its collaboration, just that it will keep "LG as the undisputed leader in smartphone audio." Another vague blurb from the press release is this:

The two companies have been working closely together on the new LG G5 to ensure the best sound experience to the customers.

NVIDIA tends to be very diligent when it comes to upgrading its first-party Android hardware. Earlier this month the company sent out an over-the-air update for the SHIELD Tablet, bumping the mostly-stock software up to Android 6.0 Marshmallow. A day later it halted the update, because early users were reporting that the new software made the tablet's Wi-Fi inoperable... which is kind of a big deal, especially when most of your tablets are Wi-Fi only. Today the problem has apparently been fixed, and the update is being resumed.